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The complicated measure of being Hispanic in America

  2. Swiyyah
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Are the terms used to classify Hispanics and Latinos too limiting? This articles seems to say yes. One could say that about every race. Being put in a box. I heard someone say once that there are more differences within a race than between different races. Do you think its true? Our society doesn't recognize that. You are this or you are that. Not some combination, or not even that at all, and maybe something entirely different. Why do we even have to categorize? Stupid census. "Hispanics and Latinos are described as the largest minority group in the United States, as a burgeoning force in the electorate and as an untapped frontier of the business market. Yet these descriptions belie the complexity of the 44 million people to whom they refer. Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions, some observers say."
Swiyyah

2 responses // The complicated measure of being Hispanic in America

  • The terms Hispanic and Latino don't acknowledge the vast cultural and ethnic diversity in Central and South
    America. Not everyone has Spanish ancestry and not everyone speaks Spanish as their dominant language.
    It would be just as bad as assuming that all Americans have British Ancestry just because the majority speaks English.

    I have friends who are from or whose families are from Central and South American countries. Their backgrounds all differ. Some have Chinese , German, French, Native American, Italian or African ancestry (to name a few) and somehow blanket terms like hispanic/latino just don't do them justice.
    adreyess
  • totally agree. most people don't seem to know just how diverse the hipsanic community is. there are hispanics of all shapes, colors, and creeds. i had a teacher once who refused to call herself a latina or hispanic beacuse she thought that, as adreyess has already pointed out, these terms don't do us justice.
    blue_blooded

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